What is the name for a Doctor of Muscles? For instance, a doctor specializing in nerves is a neurologist. A doctor specializing in the bladder system is a urologist and the list continues. There are always medical specialists for specific organs simply because the modern medical education system is reductionist which is the breakdown of the body down into pieces in its study and application of treatment even though the body functions ONE WHOLE UNIT. Every part affects every other. This is the scientific premise and fact of nature that underlies holistic medicine. A doctor of muscles is a medical manual therapist, deep tissue therapist, or manual therapist.

The school I trained in, Blue Heron Academy of Arts and Sciences has long contended that the muscles and the rest of the soft tissue need to be treated and viewed medically and has trained us accordingly to basically be muscle doctors if we do the entire advanced training. So I’ve been sticking to my training and viewing and treating the muscle and the rest of the soft tissue from a MEDICAL perspective, not an entertainment spa massage perspective or sensual massage perspective which is prostitution and caters to patriarchal abuse of women in distracting them from business and earning money and instead tries to get the woman to focus on the body as sex for money. We’re not doing it and we encourage every massage therapist to work with firm boundaries.

I can’t say this loud enough, “We don’t want to approach the body that way and it doesn’t matter if that’s what you want! Don’t come here if you want sensual massage attention, men.” Some women have an intelligent mind and don’t feel like objectifying themselves sexually in public to please men. Men need to live with that in every public profession and so far it’s an uphill battle.

One of the most recent male patients I had felt completely free to say to me, “You’re a good lookin’ woman. Why aren’t you married?” Wow. His comment about my looks was inappropriate in a professional setting. My relationship status is none of his business and I don’t need to be married. Nor do I exist for a man or woman’s consumption in some manner since most are vacant. What do they ever bring to the table as far as relationship? Nada. Marriage is good for a man’s status and it’s not good for a woman’s status. Women just need to have their own money and be single which we do now.

Body workers need to be trained as either physicians or adjunct medical professionals because muscle and soft tissue make up the majority of your body and are what actually move you through space and time in your life. It is bizarre to me that the muscle, tendon, and ligament are taken for granted anatomically. Even the nerves get a specialist; the neurologist. Yet the nerves are just another soft tissue that is also innervated by very minute blood vessels and are only compressed by muscle. The only way a nerve is affected by the disc is if the disc is injured which is far less likely than the muscle at the nerve root being contracted. The bone doesn’t touch the nerve root. The vertebral foramen is too big. It’s the muscle!

Nevertheless, if your pain level is through the roof, you need an MRI to check whether or not the disc is injured. I would refer you out in that case unless the disc is only bulging. Bulging disc is very common and very treatable with my work and your exercise but you should see a P.T. as well.

The medical professions are overlooking what could be achieved by treating the muscle, ligament, and tendon medically. This, in turn, leads to invasive treatment, drugging, and ineffective, detrimental surgery when it’s not needed. Specifically, orthopedic doctors jump in when many times they could refer to a medical manual therapist with four years of training first before they drug and do surgery. Sometimes surgery is called for but many times it’s not. Especially with back injuries, honestly, the patient needs to come to someone like me first. Back surgery does not have good outcome stats. My work does; all the time; consistently.

Please note that massage therapy and therapeutic massage are not the same as deep tissue therapy at all. You can tell by the years of training. I have 3.5 years and my training is equivalent to the Naprapathic doctors in Chicago. They do their work their way and I do mine my way. Naprapathy is not licensed in Michigan. A few of my peers in town also have that level of training. A doctor cannot be expected to send a patient to a massage therapist with only 500 hours or training which is all that is required by the state at this point.

The muscles need more than superficial, first layer massage. They need four layers, deep tissue to the bone manual therapy and that is IN FACT what I do and achieve because of my technique taught by Dr. Lawton and because of my Reiki energy. It’s not for every practitioner and I’m fine with that! But are the massage therapists fine with us? I accept them as long as they aren’t using massage therapy to cover for prostitution massage. They now have a license that I will not accept because I’m not trained in one bit of massage therapy, I don’t have a certificate, I rival them and I don’t do it.